See You Next Year, Stanley

a depressing end to the hockey season down here in NC -- the Carolina Hurricanes' playoff hopes were snuffed by Tampa Bay last night after the Canes gave up a 2-0 lead and couldn't tie the game despite pretty furious action at the end of the game. really they played themselves out of the picture last week though when they had control of their own destiny and proceeded to lose two blowouts in a row, the second one to the worst team in the league (Philly). after that it would have taken winning out and some other teams losing, and Montreal doesn't appear to want to give up their spot at this point. as Tripp Tracy pointed out last night in the post mortem, the Hurricanes had a healthy team for literally TWO periods, not games, periods, all season. that led to inconsistency for sure but at times there was an inconsistency of will which is harder to explain considering what the same team did last year.

on the plus side, i've got a few more weeks of free time than i did last year, but i'd rather be watching hockey...